


Out of Nowhere

by ereshai



Series: Check, Please! 13 Days of Halloween 2016 [8]
Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: 13 Days of Halloween, Background Eric Bittle/Jack Zimmermann - Freeform, Background Larissa "Lardo" Duan/Shitty Knight - Freeform, Background Relationships, Background Tango/Whiskey (Check Please!), Character Death, F/M, Gen, Horror, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-31
Updated: 2016-10-31
Packaged: 2018-08-28 03:33:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 910
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8430223
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ereshai/pseuds/ereshai
Summary: The AlumniKegster of 2017 was in full swing.





	

The AlumniKegster of 2017 was in full swing. Hockey players old and new filled the Haus – more new than old; too many had moved away or had moved on to lives beyond college hockey. But the important people were there; i.e., the most recent former residents of the Haus. Holster and Ransom had flown back specifically for the event; Shitty and Lardo had made the trip from Boston; Jack had arrived after a late practice; even Johnson had made it, fresh off his most recent journey up the Appalachian Trail (“Everyone necessary for this particular narrative is here, so don’t worry about the others,” he’d said, which everyone else ignored, so Dex did too).

It was likely to be the last kegster of the school year, so Bitty had gone all out. That meant pies. Everyone’s favorites, in fact. (There were a lot of pies. A lot. Dex had helped Bitty bake them, so he was intimately aware of how many there were.) There was also a lot of tub juice and a lot of beer and they partied well into the night, retelling stories that most of them had been there for and sharing new ones.

Dex and Nursey had offered up their attic room to Ransom and Holster when it became apparent that no one really wanted to leave. Jack and Bitty were in Bitty’s room, of course. Chowder had given up his room to Shitty and Lardo and crashed on the blue couch, the green couch’s slightly less putrid replacement (it had been set on fire, _accidentally_ , according to Bitty). Tango and Whiskey had stumbled up to Tango’s room hours ago. Johnson was fast asleep in an armchair. (“I won’t be in it for long. No, not long at all.” Dex ignored him.) Nursey was curled up in a corner – Dex still didn’t know how he was able to do it. Dex found himself nodding off at the kitchen table, and with nowhere else to go, he just went with it, slumping down on the table with his head resting on his arms. He’d slept in worse places.

The creak of the basement door woke him. It was slowly swinging closed. As Dex lifted his head, he heard the scuffle of a footstep on the stairs. Who would be down there at this time of the night?

Dex got up and stretched, working out the stiffness in his back. He went to the basement door and opened it. The dim light was on. “Hello?”

No one answered, but there was an odd scraping sound coming from somewhere down there. Dex went down the stairs – if something was broken, he’d be the one who ended up fixing it anyway. The sound stopped abruptly when he reached the bottom.

Tango was sprawled on the basement floor, his eyes half open and his face slack in a way that screamed ‘wrong’ to Dex. Whiskey was beside him, face down, his neck twisted at an unnatural angle. Dex hurried over and fell to his knees beside them, but it was obviously too late. They were both dead.

Someone was standing behind him.

“They were having sex,” Johnson said. “I just couldn’t pass up the trope. And here we have another one – the creepy basement. I wasn’t sure if I’d made enough noise to wake you.”

“What?” Dex couldn’t take it in. Johnson had killed Tango and Whiskey? For having sex? He’d never even met them before tonight. He got to his feet carefully. Johnson was standing between him and the stairs. Maybe if he yelled?

“I closed the door. That will muffle any noise. And frankly, everyone’s passed out from drinking so much. They wouldn’t hear you if you were standing right beside them. How do you think I got these two without waking the whole Haus?”

“Why did you do this?”

“It’s so hard to keep track of who I am nowadays,” Johnson said pensively. “I’m not as tied to canon, so I find myself…drifting. Between stories. It’s very wearing.”

“What are you talking about?” Dex felt behind him for something, anything he could use to defend himself.

“For the purposes of this story, I’m homicidal, right? I had a lot of time to myself on the Appalachian Trail, where I apparently have been for a long time. Lots and lots of trips, lots and lots of time… Lots of time to think. About my place in the narrative. My place out of it. If I’m not actively a part of it, do I even exist?”

“You’re right in front of me.” Dex took a small step away, still reaching blindly. There had to be something he could use.

“There’s no escape, but you can keep trying if it makes you feel better. Anyway, then I realized none of us really exist no matter how much a part of the story we are. And I’m pretty tired of having all of your nonexistent lives shoved into my head whenever some author decides I need to be present to fill a plot hole or break the fourth wall or whatever reason they come up with. So while I am still a tool of authorial intent, I have to say that I am not unhappy that I finally get to do something about it. Even if it’s only temporary.”

Dex took another step and tripped over Whiskey’s outflung arm.

Johnson lifted his machete. “It’s not murder if you’re not real.”

**Author's Note:**

> Let me know if I should tag Major Character Death in addition to the Character Death tag.  
> I don't dislike any of these characters, I promise. This just...happened.  
> Also, I wrote this quickly and didn't have time to build the suspense and fake you out with another suspect and then do a surprise reveal of the real killer. Sorry. (But less characters were killed this way. Silver lining, folks, it's there if you look hard enough.)


End file.
